Tar Heel triathletes
Open to competitors of all abilities, the UNC Triathlon Club prepares Tar Heels for competitions throughout North Carolina and the country while also connecting them with members of the Carolina community.
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For a group of athletes on Carolina’s campus, each day’s practice not only involves a different uniform — it involves a different sport entirely.
The UNC Triathlon Club runs on Mondays, swims on Thursdays and rides bikes on Saturdays, with nearly 30 members along for the journey. The team, which is open to Tar Heels of all ability levels, combines their three sports to compete in triathlons in North Carolina and around the country several times each semester.
“We compete in a mid-Atlantic conference with a lot of other schools, both public and private, of different sizes,” said Olivia Romine, a junior and captain of the club. “As a club, we generally compete at the Sprint and Olympic distance.”
Sprint triathlons involve a .46-mile swim, 12.4-mile bike ride and 3.1-mile run. Olympic triathlons double each of those distances.
Undergraduates make up the bulk of the UNC Triathlon Club, but faculty members, graduate students and professional students are also team members. For Nathan Andert, a Pharm.D. student in the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy, the triathlon club has been a way to get more connected at Carolina.
“Being able to get involved in the school outside of my program is one of my favorite things about the team,” Andert said. “It’s a great break from school and class to be able to do something that’s totally unrelated to my coursework.”
